Roulette
by Paradigm of Writing
Summary: East, west, north, south... regardless of which direction Calem takes, he cannot right himself on a path geared towards his success. It's always about what she wants, what she wants to do, who she wants to be seen with. His life is a game of roulette, for Calem will always feel that he's not good enough for her. He's not good enough for Serena. At least, that's what he thinks.


**Hey everyone, it's Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new one-shot called Roulette. This idea came to me roughly two or three days ago, after doing a binge reading of Natekun's (amazing writer by the way, read his work!) Calem x Serena which left me flabbergasted, speechless etc... any word in the book you want me to use. This idea is heavily centered on the symbolism and imagery of a roulette wheel where numbers are replaced by the cardinal directions. After an also bad discovery of Pokemon MMD *cough* I am now in the pairing frenzy pretty much. It's awkward, I know. I've had some help- especially with the opening of this one-shot, and I hope you all enjoy a look at my darker side in the Pokemon fandom. Enjoy!**

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 _Laugh, cry, fall over screaming, die inside till nothing's left... Calem's life in a nutshell. The poor girl never saw it coming, she just did her job spinning that damned roulette wheel over and over again._

.

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 _ **East**_

If someone were to tell Calem Mitchell that good fortune was coming his way, he'd scoff before bursting out into hearty laughter. Depending on how well he knew the person, he'd either speak before or after the tears had left his eyes. His reply normally would be, "My fortune only comes for whichever direction _she_ decides it should." The fellow conversationalist, out of mutual respect, would frown and then ask, "She?"

A beautiful twinkle would be added to the normally cheerful glint in Calem's eyes before he heartily replied, "Yes! Serene Ingo of course! My next door neighbor! My girlfriend!"

The conversation would then always turn abruptly from a gay banter to one of concern. Following his statement, would come the same reply regardless of how Calem had voiced the previous sentence. "Calem, Serena is in Sinnoh on a summer term for Professor Sycamore. She hasn't been in Kalos for nearly three years. Last time she was here, Serena was engaged to a gym leader from Johto... a Morty Paladine. Calem, she isn't your girlfriend."

Calem's eyes would then slowly, ever so slowly, narrow till they were slits coming from a snake's head. In a low hiss, he'd grab the other's arm in fiery rage. "Are you calling me a liar? I know very well who I'm betrothed to! How dare you accuse me of such a thing!" A slap with the force of a Mach truck behind him would be slammed into the friend's face before Calem would scream at them the whole way as they fled the restaurant with their very lives.

Chuckling lightly, he would begin to spin in his chair at the bar, giggling to his heart's content. "I am going east! She is calling me that way!" he'd cry out. With Serena Ingo by his side, Calem Mitchell was invincible. There was the time he had charged into Malva's Pyroar at a league meeting because the lion had eaten off of his plate of food, all the while shrieking that Serena told him to beat the cat to oblivion. Down in Stantalune Forest, the poor critters would run from Calem's incriminating glare as his Greninja ripped through the bug pokemon without a second glance. Serena had told him to exterminate the whole forest, his roulette wheel was indicating to go south- and south Calem went. Viola had to restrict him, banning him from the forest for the rest of his life. If an occurrence came up where he had to go to Vaniville Town, flying was the best option.

Calem's laugh echoes throughout the whole bar. "Insanity... insanity is a boy's best friend," he'd mutter. Growling with deep anger backing his voice, he leered at the bartender. "What the hell are you looking at?"

In Calem Mitchell's mind, he was alright. In anyone else's, the poor kid was breaking down, and breaking down he was.

.

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 ** _West_**

Shalour City was impressive in the spirit of it's citizens, and Korrina made sure to embrace the strength radiating within the hearts of her fellow friends and cohorts. Calem often visited only because he had nowhere else to go. Valerie would normally accompany him, making sure he never did anything rash, but she had a slew of challengers back at her gym, leaving Calem and Korrina alone together. It wasn't the first time, and that made Valerie explicitly worried. For the day, he had to go west. Serena's voice in his head said he had to. Sitting on a bench overlooking the sandy path to the Tower of Mastery, there he and Korrina sat, embracing the cry of Wingull in the bay, or the playful croak of his Greninja and her Croagunk.

Calem looked at the gym leader, taking in her brilliant sunbeam blonde hair, adorned by the striking cardinal and onyx laced roller skates at her ankles, and the formidable Mega Glove. He licks his lips, unsure of how to bring out what he wishes to say. In a dream, he heard Serena's voice. It warned him of a fact he couldn't ignore. Trevor, who in a surprising manner of events, was dating Korrina and abusing her. "Korrina, I heard from Shauna that Trevor is hurting you." he lies, scooting over and patting her on the back.

Korrina looks at her friend, face in shock. "Umm... no, he's not. Shauna told you that? Impossible. Trevor and I haven't talked to her in five months; she's somewhere in Lumiose studying to be a professor. And besides, you know Trevor. He's not like that."

"I feel that you're lying to me," Calem doesn't bat an eye. In his twisted mind, Serena is telling him to go west. Throw everything and everyone you know into the sea near Cyllage, you're life will be easier if you do. "I can tell. I mean, Serena does it to me all the time. Last night, she stabbed me in the gut with an ice cream cone. Night before, made a scene with me at the Pokemon League dinner because I ordered the wrong wine. Simple things like that... but, yours seems to be on a deeper level."

The Shalour City Gym Leader is frozen in stupefaction, absorbing the true depth of Calem's insanity. "Do- do you hear yourself? Serena is dating that Johto boy, she has been for quite some time too. Serena isn't here, most certainly to not abuse you. I believe you were dreaming."

"I was! So, you then know what I'm talking about!" Calem points his finger in the air, voicing his happiness in a surge of pride.

"No, but only the mere fact that you should see someone about your... predicament. Trevor and I are fine. He hasn't hurt me physically, nor emotionally." Korrina corrects herself, making sure to draw the invisible line in the sand.

However, Calem balls his fist and ignores everything else that Korrina says. "Predicament? I have no _predicament,_ nor an issue, Korrina. You should look in the mirror before passing judgment."

Korrina pauses, her eyes glinting in ferocious rage. "And what exactly are you saying?"

"You're a slut!" Calem screams, pushing Korrina off the bench and into the dirt.

"Excuse me! What makes you think you can talk to me like that?" Korrina hisses, slapping Calem across the face.

"Believe me, I know exactly what it is you do. How many times did you have to screw around with Trevor to make him feel worthless? Knowing you, only once. That's how you view us. Men are just your playthings, little toys that are discarded after old use."

Korrina stares at him, cold rage matching muted fury. She speaks, her voice dangerously calm. If she had no self-control, the gym leader just might've Power-Up Punched her friend in the throat. "I suggest you leave here, and never come back. Take as long as you wish, Calem. You may talk to me again when you have the right mind to speak to a lady. If Serena was here, and she was dating you... why, she'd never stand for this. You'd be left out in the rain alone. Grow up, Mitchell. The world is doing so without you."

Calem scoffs, mustering the courage to spit in Korrina's face. "Gladly. I wanted to leave this city ever since I first stepped foot into your gym."

The two part ways, Greninja and Croagunk flabbergasted and speechless at the spectacle performed by their own trainers. Calem doesn't have anywhere else to go, and he picks maybe the worst person in the world to go to next.

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 ** _South_**

Light conversation spurs from the table that Calem and Trevor sit at, dining illustriously out in one of Anistar City's most praised restaurants, the Grand Psychic Club. Calem slowly sips a cup of coffee, even so that it's ninety-eight degrees and sweltering. Sweat drips off of his forehead like the drops of medicine contained in an IV stalk in his medical ward. Trevor is across from him, a croissant and chocolate bar being his breakfast.

The two friends catch up on lost details, but Calem refrains from mentioning the incident at Shalour City. Trevor, in the mill of things, briefly mentions how Korrina wasn't answering his texts about Calem, however dismissing it as just girl things he cannot understand. "Does Serena do that to you now," Trevor asks, sipping from his glass of iced tea. "I mean, ever since she left for Johto, she hasn't been in touch with me. A little bothersome I know, but maybe she has better things to do..."

Calem's right eye twitches, and without warning, he vaults from his chair, over the table, and crashes into Trevor. The two boys collapse to the sidewalk, plates and glasses clattering to the concrete. With a resonating shatter, Calem's coffee mug breaks into millions of pieces. The reverbing echo thumps against his heart like the fragmented bits of his mind, but he cannot concentrate on that. What matters is making Trevor pay for his comment.

He is pounding his fist into Trevor's face, screaming at the top of his lungs. "You say one more bad thing about Serena and I'll make you drown in your own blood! Don't you ever speak about her like that again, do you understand me?" Trevor is crying, all the while trying to defend himself and stop the trauma to his skull. Covering himself weakly, he cowers under Calem's glare.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" he cries, trying to take his mind off of the agonizing pain. Calem sneers.

"That'll never be good enough for me."

Being ripped apart by several other patrons, Trevor leaps to his feet and runs from Anistar City. His problems need to hide elsewhere. Calem, on the other hand is broken and battered. Blood trickles from his nose, his sleeve damp and soggy with crimson stains that remind him of a past he wishes to not remember. Tears come, ruthless shudders follow, and behind all of that are memories that cause vomit to suddenly reappear on the sidewalk by the Grand Psychic Club. Calem's entire body is racketed with violent aches, and he is rocking back and forth muttering to himself of grassy plains and scorching suns.

"She told me to head south. My life needed to go downhill. That's what she said! I swear it!" he argues with himself.

All is not well with Calem Mitchell. Perhaps he'll never be.

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 ** _North_**

The knock at his door, on a Sunday morning at midnight no less, is enough to get Calem out of bed. Groaning, he hears the dull booming of thunder, the _SPLIT SPLAT_ of raindrops on the windowsill, and the crash of lightning that makes him think some wild Jolteon is doing it nearby. He opens the door, assuming someone must be lost in the rain and needs a place to say.

The person huddled in a ball at his doorstep is not who he expects.

Beautiful hair, glowing a vibrant yellow... two diamond eyes filled with darkness and sadness. Lips that taste like candy, porcelain fingers that rake and scratch. He cannot believe his eyes. Serena told him- have your life go north. And to him, it seems that it sure as hell did.

"Serena?" Calem cries, staring at his long time friend, huddled in his doorway.

As he goes to embrace her, something in his heart burns warmly. Perhaps his roulette wheel was on his side for once. Just maybe.

It is only a hope.

But, that sure is a damn good thing.

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 **Somewhere in the unorthodox corners of my mind, this made sense. I swear to you it did! I realize this may be the first and last time some of you will read my writing because you are just too freaked out, which is okay. If you are indeed confused, send me a PM and I'll explain the hidden meaning behind this story to the best of my ability- as it sounded brilliant in my head and maybe not so good on paper, haha. Thank you all for reading, and if you are inclined, leave me a review letting me know what you thought! I'd be blessed to get something other than praise. Legitimate criticism is sought after, as I do not get it enough. I need it more than you think. Love you all, and I appreciate the support. See you in other writing endeavors.**

 **~ Paradigm**


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